The Thing I'm Most Afraid Of

by Kristin Levine

  And then, as if that weren’t bad enough, someone knocked on the stall door.

  “It’s occupied,” I called out, confused. It was a big bathroom; there were plenty of empty stalls.

  “Ist alles in Ordnung?” I heard a strange woman ask. “Kann ich irgendwie helfen?”

  I peeked through the stall doors and saw an older woman with gray hair wearing a white apron and clutching a roll of paper towels. Another woman was at the sink, washing her hands. When she finished, the gray-haired woman handed her a paper towel, and the other woman placed a coin into an ashtray on the counter.

  She was a bathroom attendant! My dad had warned me about this. Some bathrooms in Austria weren’t free—you had to pay to use them. And I didn’t have any money!

  My panic, which had almost started to subside, soared again. Even bathrooms in Austria weren’t safe! I waited until the gray-haired woman was busy giving another girl a paper towel, and then I burst out of the stall. I tore out of the park, past the fun house and the roller coaster, running without purpose or direction, just trying to get away.

  Finally, the stitch in my side got too strong, and I collapsed onto a bench. I sobbed in relief. Great big hysterical sobs. The kind that felt like they would never stop.

  “Becca?” I heard a voice ask.

  I looked up. Sara waited on the sidewalk, a good ten feet away. Felix hovered behind her.

  “Go away,” I muttered.

  I was so utterly embarrassed. Except for Mom and Dad, no one had ever seen me like this, not even my best friend, Chrissy.

  But Sara didn’t go away. Instead, she approached slowly, as if I were a wild animal that might bolt. Sara sat down on one side of the bench; Felix perched on the other end and pulled out his book. I was grateful that he was at least going to pretend he wasn’t listening.

  I tensed and waited for the lecture. It’s okay. You’re safe. Don’t cry. But it didn’t come. Sara just sat there. Felix read on. A couple of kids walked by, but they didn’t even glance at me. It was hot, and a nearby trash can smelled bad. Eventually, I gave one last little gasp/hiccup and stopped crying.

  Still nothing.

  “I’m sorry,” I said when I couldn’t stand the silence anymore.

  Sara shrugged. “Worse things have happened.”

  “It’s embarrassing.”

  “Why?” Sara asked. “Your father warned me you might get nervous.”

  “But you bought the tickets, and we didn’t even get to go!” My father would be upset about that too. It was just like when I’d wanted to see Les Mis on my birthday.

  “You tried be brave,” Sara said. “That’s worth a little money.”

  “But I failed.”

  Sara shrugged again. “Maybe next time you won’t.”

  Felix sat still as a statue.

  “I wanted to see the view,” I admitted. “My dad and I watched the movie . . .”

  “The Third Man,” Felix finished, whispering to the pages in his book.

  “You’ve seen it too?”

  Felix nodded. “My father likes old American movies. Sometimes he takes me to the English-language theater. It has all the movies in their original language with German subtitles. Most movies here are dubbed into German. Subtitles are so much better.”

  “Why?” I asked.

  Felix gave me a look. “Sara made me go see The Bodyguard at a regular theater. Imagine Whitney Houston and Kevin Costner speaking in German!”

  I snorted.

  “And then, as if that wasn’t awkward enough, Whitney’s character randomly starts singing in English. Because they don’t bother to dub the songs.”

  “Beautiful movie,” Sara put in. “So romantic!”

  “It’s awful,” Felix insisted. “But good for a laugh.”

  I gave a weak smile. “Where does your dad live?”

  “He’s an actor, so he moves around a lot,” Felix said.

  “Cool,” I said. “What’s he been in?”

  “Nothing you’d know,” Felix said. “I think he’s in Graz right now.”

  “When do you see him?” I asked. “I mean, what’s your custody schedule? Week on, week off? Or weekends? Or do you . . .”

  Felix stared at the Ferris wheel. “He sees me when he can.”

  “Oh,” I said.

  “He’s not like your dad,” he added, so quietly I almost couldn’t hear.

  “Oh,” I said again.

  Felix shrugged. “I’m sorry I pressured you to go on the rides. Mama told me you sometimes get anxious, but I thought she was just . . .”

  “It’s okay.” I was still embarrassed, but I was also thinking about what he had said about his father. My dad had moved to Vienna, but he had never once missed our Sunday phone call. What would it feel like not to be exactly sure where your father lived? And what did Sara mean when she said worse things have happened?

  It was such a pretty day. It must have been an amazing view from the top of the Riesenrad. I felt another pang of regret deep in my stomach, but I didn’t think I was going to throw up anymore.

  “We leave now?” Sara asked.

  “Sure,” I said.

  We stood up and walked back to the subway. I was quiet as we took it partway across town and then switched back to streetcar 38. I felt sick again as the jerky motion of the streetcar rocked me back and forth. It was crowded, and I had to stand, holding on to an orange strap hanging from the ceiling. It was too high for me and made my arm ache. Every time I lost my balance, the woman standing next to me glared. “Aufpassen!” she yelled.

  I would have done what she wanted, but I didn’t understand.

  Then Sara ushered us off the streetcar and onto the bus. “You okay?” Sara asked.

  “Yes,” I said. Parts of the day had been really fun, but now I just felt like I was a wet towel and someone had tried to squeeze all the water out of me. I couldn’t wait to get home, eat a nice quiet dinner with my father, and watch some TV. Dad said he sometimes watched Full House dubbed into German to practice his language skills. I wanted to see that.

  My feet ached as we walked up Dad’s front steps. It was after five, and I pictured my father sitting on the couch, reading a book. Maybe we’d have grilled cheese sandwiches and tomato soup for dinner. That was what Dad always cooked for me when I was feeling down. I could almost taste the melted cheese in my mouth as I put the key in the lock.

  But as I opened the door, it wasn’t the smell of toasted bread that wafted out. Instead, it smelled like meat and spices. And on the stereo, blasting at full volume, was an opera.

  CHAPTER 11

  Sitting with Fear

  My dad was in the kitchen with Katarina, both of them wearing matching aprons. My father, who only cooked grilled cheese and frozen pizza at home, was chopping an onion with a knife that looked big enough to decapitate Bambi. Katarina was stirring something thick and meaty in a big pot on the stove. A new song started on the CD player, and they sang together, “La donna è mobile qual piuma al vento!” They looked like something out of a pasta ad.

  I wasn’t sure if I wanted to laugh or cry. I was so exhausted, I just stood there for a moment, staring. The music was loud, and they hadn’t heard us come in. Finally, Dad turned and noticed me standing there. “Oh, Becca!” he called. “Good! You’re home.”

  “Schatzi!” Katarina ran over and tried to give me a big hug. I jerked away.

  I saw her flinch and felt a little bad. I didn’t want to hurt her feelings, but . . . “What’s going on?” I sounded angrier than I meant to, but I just wanted to flop down on the couch.

  Dad didn’t notice. “Katarina and I are cooking dinner to celebrate your first full day in Austria. We’re making goulash!”

  I could see my dreams of Full House and grilled cheese going up in smoke as surely as if someone had tossed a cast-iron frying pa
n into the TV. So while Felix said “Yum” and Sara licked her lips, I stormed up the stairs to my room.

  Okay, so maybe it wasn’t my finest hour.

  I threw myself down onto my bed, not sure if I was angry or sad. I wanted to talk to my mom, but when I stood up to get the phone, I remembered I was in Austria. And unlike at my Virginia home, here I didn’t have a phone line in my room. (Dad had given me some long explanation about a statewide monopoly and the expense of phone lines and blah blah blah.) There was only one phone in the house—and it was in the kitchen.

  I burst out crying again.

  There was a knock on my door.

  “Go away,” I cried.

  “Becca,” I heard Dad ask, “what’s going on?”

  “Nothing,” I blubbered.

  “Sara said there was an . . . incident at the Prater today and . . .”

  “I don’t want to talk about it.”

  “Okay.” He paused. “Could you please come downstairs? Dinner is almost ready.”

  “No.”

  “Rebecca, we have guests.”

  “I don’t care.”

  “Young lady, I do not . . .”

  “Just leave me alone!”

  I could hear him lurking outside the door, standing on a squeaky floorboard and shifting his weight from one foot to the other. “Fine,” he said finally.

  I listened to him walk back down the stairs. “I don’t understand,” he said, loud enough for me to hear. “She was doing so much better.”

  My heart sank. He was frustrated with me. But I had been doing better. Until he’d gone and moved to Austria! I was picking up my Doomsday Journal when there was another knock at the door.

  It was Katarina. “Becca,” she cooed, “are you feeling okay?”

  I didn’t bother to answer.

  “I bet you’re tired from a long day of sightseeing. I’ve got some tomato and mozzarella on the table for you to eat while the goulash is finishing up.”

  “I’m not hungry,” I lied. I was starving. McDonald’s seemed like a long, long time ago in a galaxy far, far away.

  “All right.” Through the door I could hear her start to leave, then pause. “Do you not like Verdi? I could put on some Mozart.”

  “Just go away!” I snapped.

  She did.

  They left me alone for about twenty minutes. I sat at the small desk, writing down all the horrible things that had happened that day. There were some good things too—like the Apfelstrudel and toothache Jesus and even McDonald’s—but I didn’t know where to put those. It was a Doomsday Journal, not a Rainbows and Butterflies Journal. I was mulling it over when there was another knock at my door. “I don’t want to talk!”

  But this time the door opened, and Sara walked in. I was too surprised to protest when she sat down on my bed. “Good,” she said. “Because I want you to listen to my story.”

  Okay, so that was not what I’d expected. I studied her for a moment. Her green-streaked hair was limp from the heat. She had washed her face, and without the eyeliner and lipstick, she looked much younger. But she didn’t look pitying, like Katarina and Dad had sounded. She looked serious, and suddenly I was curious.

  “I grew up in Sarajevo,” she started. “You know where that is?”

  “In Bosnia. It used to be part of Yugoslavia.”

  “Yes, Sarajevo is a beautiful city. There is a river that runs through the middle—the Miljacka. We can see the bridge across the river from our apartment. In summer, I like to sit on the riverbank with my friends. In the evening, Mama buys us ice cream, and the three of us walk across the bridge.”

  “What about your father?” I asked.

  “He died in a car accident when Eldin was a baby. It was very sad, but still . . . we were happy. Mama was math teacher at the elementary school. She loves flowers so much our whole apartment was full of them. I like music and dancing, and I planned to be a language teacher like my father. Everyone said I had his gift.

  “Sarajevo was a very diverse and exciting place. The city was mainly Muslim, but Serbs and Croats lived there too. They were Orthodox Christians or Roman Catholic, but for years, it did not matter. We all went to the same school and lived in the same apartment buildings and ate the same ice cream.”

  “Wasn’t Yugoslavia a communist country?” I asked.

  “Yes, it became communist after World War II.”

  “I thought communism didn’t allow religion.”

  Sara shrugged. “We had no official religion. But everyone knew their own religion and celebrated with family and friends. Catholic kids get Christmas presents in December, Serbs in January, and we have Ramadan. The dates change every year, but our neighbors always came over to eat Eid cake.”

  “So what happened?” I asked.

  “How to explain?” She sighed. “There were lots of boring referendums and talk of independent states. The leader of Serbian Republic—Slobodan Milošević—wanted get rid of Muslims and Catholics in other republics. Wanted to have a ‘pure’ Yugoslavia. I thought that was nonsense, just politicians talking. It had nothing to do with me.

  “Until my violin teacher sent Mama a note saying she would not give me lessons anymore. Because she was a good Serb and we are Muslim. Then my dance partner not show up at the studio the next week. At least he stopped by our apartment to say it not personal. They were Croats and had nothing against Muslims, but his father did not want to upset his neighbors, so he not allowed to associate with me anymore.”

  “That’s awful!”

  Sara nodded. “Snipers moved into the hills around the city. There was no more swimming or ice cream or even school. We had to close all the blinds in our apartment so snipers not target us. Sometimes we ate dinner in the bathroom. It was the only room with no windows, which made it the safest. But without sunlight, all of Mama’s flowers died.

  “And then the shelling started. I remember the first night bombs fell. We went down to the cellar. I not sleep at all.”

  I thought about Sara and her mother and brother trying to sleep in a cellar with bombs falling overhead. And I had gotten terrified about going on a Ferris wheel? “I’m sorry,” I said. “That sounds awful. You must think I’m an idiot for freaking out about a ride!”

  “No.” Sara looked surprised. “That not point of story. I only try to tell you, I understand fear. I cry all that first night. I not brave at all. So you not need to be embarrassed.”

  “But you were actually in danger!” I said. “You had a reason to feel afraid.”

  “Fear is strange. I think sometimes our bodies get confused. Scared is good if you can do something. If you can leave. It is why I got on the bus and left Sarajevo. But when I was stuck there in the cellar, fear did no good. I learned if you sit with fear long enough, it goes away.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “My first night in bomb shelter, I not sleep at all. Third night, I sleep one hour. And by sixth, I take blanket and curl up to sleep. I learn to deal with fear. And you will too.”

  I shook my head.

  “You will,” she insisted. “But now, time for dinner.”

  I wasn’t sure that she was right about me learning to sit with fear, but I was hungry. So when she stood up and left my room, I followed her.

  CHAPTER 12

  Käfer

  Felix and Dad were already seated at the table when Sara and I came down the stairs. Katarina was serving big ladlefuls of a thick reddish stew into bowls. “Oh, hello, Schatzi,” she said brightly to me, as if my freak-out had never happened.

  Dad looked a bit warier but patted my arm kindly. “You feeling better?” he asked.

  “Yeah,” I said awkwardly. “Sorry. I was just tired.”

  I sat down. No one spoke. Sara passed me a round roll. I noticed how she tore the bread and then dipped a piece into the stew. I did
the same.

  Okay, I gotta admit, it was delicious. The beef was tender, and the sauce was a rich tomatoey gravy. I took another bite. “It’s really good.”

  The tension in the room relaxed a bit. I was about to take another bite when Felix started screaming.

  “Käfer!”

  I didn’t know what that meant.

  But he said it again. “Käfer!” And with such intensity, I started to get concerned.

  “In der Suppe!” he screamed. He pointed at his bowl of goulash.

  Whatever it was, it seemed bad. I looked down at my bowl. There was meat and the tomato sauce. Onions. Tiny black sesame seeds. It tasted good. One of my favorite things I’d eaten since arriving in . . . Wait a second.

  The sesame seeds were moving.

  I looked closer. Maybe I had just hit them with my spoon. Nope. Definitely moving. I had a sinking feeling. Maybe they weren’t toasted sesame seeds. Maybe they were . . .

  “Bugs!” Dad exclaimed and jumped up from his chair so fast, he knocked his water glass over.

  Everything seemed to happen at once then. Dad ran for a towel to mop up the water. Katarina started crying. Felix kept yelling, “Käfer! Käfer!” I stared at my bowl. There were hundreds of little black beetles swimming happily around. And I had just eaten this. There wasn’t even a page in my Doomsday Journal for something this gross.

  Then Sara started laughing. Big belly laughs. Gasping so hard, she could barely breathe. “So funny!” She choked. “Katarina added more and more paprika.”

  Dad guffawed as he mopped up the water. “Yeah. She kept saying, ‘It’s not red enough.’”

  Katarina continued to sob.

  Felix poked at his bowl with a sour expression on his face. “Did anyone look at the jar?”

  “No!” Dad was laughing now. “We just kept adding more.”

  Katarina looked absolutely stricken. “I just wanted a nice traditional meal for Rebecca! Oh Gott, everything goes wrong for me.” Her mascara ran down her face. Dad went over and put an arm around her shoulders.